A front-page Y2K story

As the former business editor of the Longview News-Journal here in Northeast Texas, I've been waiting patiently for the Cox daily to do some substantive reporting on Y2K. I'm still waiting, despite the fact there were two stories about the issue in today's edition. One, on the front page, reported on the progress of Southwestern Electric Power Co. "Utility makes Y2K readiness its top priority," read the headline. "It's a top company priority--we're committed to be completely ready by mid-1999," SWEPCO spokeswoman Becky McJunkins said. The company has budgeted $42 million for the fix; it has spent, to date, $4 million.
The story went on the note that "while SWEPCO officials cannot guarantee its customers will have electrical service when 2000 rolls around, all efforts are being made to assure service continues."

The second story concerned remarks by an employee of Computerland who told a chamber gathering that most of their computers will work just fine. The final paragraph of that story, however, said, "More than 850 Texas banks already have been deemed in compliance with Y2K standards." As that was news to me, I called my successor at the paper and asked him where that figure came from. He said it came from the speaker, a Dan Hill, so I called Dan Hill and asked him where he got the number. He wasn't sure, but thought he'd either read it or someone had told him about it. Ha!

Despite all that, it looks--as was noted in an earlier thread--that Y2K is starting to really go mainstream. As well, neither of the two stories had the obligatory 1900/2000 explanation, an indication in itself that the issue is now mainstream. The paper's URL is www.news-journal.com

Taylor County Electric out of Abilene has been running tv commercials
touting themselves as "y2k ready". But when you go to their website,
nowhere does it say "y2k compliant" what it does say that their trucks
will be gassed up and ready to go on 12-31-99. Is that what they mean
by "y2k ready"? Lovely. However, this was a month or so ago, I guess
I should go back and check their site again. They may have added some
other important piece of information (aaarggg) since then.